Reflection

So far I have some pictures, a narrative, and an idea in mind. I am doing mine on learning how to play the guitar, so I found a bunch of images relating to that. My next step was to decide how to put it all together. I was not sure where to even start with that. I knew that I could throw some images into moviemaker, but that would not be the best way to go about doing it. I then realized that I needed to write a narrative to help with the process. As I was writing, a lot of different ideas came to mind...all of a sudden I had images I knew I was going to ask my parents back home to send me and where they were going to correspond to my narrative. I found that writing the narrative first was the best way, for me, to get started on this process and get something accomplished. My next difficulty is becoming friendly with the technical aspect of moviemaker, and once I get that done I will be on my way.

Learning and Action

I thought it was very interesting when Gee says, "For efficacious learning, humans need overt information, but they have a hard time handling it. They also need immersion in actual contexts of practice, but they can find such contexts confusing without overt information and guidance." At first my reaction to this was Huh? but after I reread it, it started to make sense (sometimes I feel like Gee has a weird way of wording things that just confuse me, instead of just saying what he means in plain English). Basically what this means is that if learning is to be effective, we need information that is open to everyone and makes sense, but sometimes this is a problem for people. Then it goes on to say that we need to be immersed in, or thrown into, actual situations of learning, but sometimes this is a problem without the information and help. I can relate this to many times in school. I had teachers who would teach teach teach, but nothing they said really clicked until we got some hands on experience. Then there were the teachers who would just throw us into the learning activity without really telling us what to do, and that wasn't very effective either. I think a good teacher really has to find the balance between the two and it will create much more success in students' learning.

Chapter Four

In chapter four, Gee brings up an interesting four-step process which must be used to be successful in video games. The four steps are:
1. probe
2. hypothesize
3. reprobe
4. rethink
He says that in a video game, a player must look around the current environment (probing), guess what something might mean (hypothesize), see what effect they get with that guess (reprobing), and then either keep or change that hypothesis by what they have learned (rethinking). He uses this process in terms of video games, but then he shows how it can be used in learning as well. I found this to be very interesting because it is very true; whether we realize we are doing it or not. An example that comes to mind is when a young child is given three shaped blocks, a square shape, a triangle shape, and a rectangle shape. They also have a table in front of them with the three respective shapes cut out of it; the object being to fit the right blocks in the holes. The young child would go through those four steps: they'd look around at the shapes to see which one they were going to pick up, and maybe they would pick up the square (probing), then they would make a guess as to which hole it fit into, maybe they would try to put it in the triangle hole (hypothesize), then they would see how that guess worked out for them, seeing that it didn't fit (reprobing), and finally they would try a different hole, changing their original hypothesis (rethinking).
I found this to be very interesting because it is definitely something we all do, we just don't realize we are doing it. It is in our subconscious.

Gee- Chapter Two

Claim- Images in texts are integrated into textbooks, newspapers, and magazines and are holding more and more weight in modern days.
Evidence- "In many modern high school and college textbooks in the sciences, images not only take up more space, they now carry meanings that are independent of the words in the text." (p. 13).
Opinion- I agree with this statement because I know that for me, an author can say something in a hundred different ways, but then it just clicks as soon as I see a diagram/picture. This is especially true in science subjects.

Claim- It is important for people to undertsand that there are different meanings between different specific situations within a domain; therefore games have multiple meanings.
Evidence- "Elements in the content of Pikmin do not have just one general meaning or significance in the game world." (p. 40).
Opinion- I am not really sure how I feel about this. I guess I can kind of understand what he is saying, that in games people can view things differently, but then again I think that a small percentage of players see things that way. Most probably see it in one dimention, which is probably how the game creator meant for it to be.